Business as usual, even without permit

Each night, Elizabeth Miller steps outside her Upper Nazareth Township home to feed her three horses. But instead of a clear, refreshing country evening, Miller says, she occasionally sees a mist rising in the air and smells a stifling odor.

The source of the smell is unclear, but Miller says it comes from the sprawling set of buildings just beyond her cornfield, where a steel coating plant has operated for years under two companies despite repeated violations of state environmental regulations.

"The smell, especially at night, can take your breath away," said Miller, sitting at her kitchen table recently with her husband, Roger. "We've always asked each other, "How can they get away with this?"'

None of the plant's violations have noted off-site odors. But since 2001, two privately owned companies -- Steel Management Systems and Encor Coatings -- have operated the plant and violated dozens of other regulations created to keep the community safe from hazardous pollutants, a Morning Call review of state environmental records shows.

Perhaps most troubling, environmental advocates say, is that the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection allowed the plant -- designated as a "high priority" violator -- to continue to do business for more than three years without a valid operating permit.

The permit, a legally required document that allows state and federal officials to track and limit air pollution, became invalid when Steel Management Systems took over in August 2005 and was not renewed by the DEP until April of this year, according to a DEP timeline.

"It's a definite hole in the system, and it can lead to problems," said Nathan Willcox, a clean air advocate with PennEnvironment, a statewide advocacy group. "We've seen it before. It's just another indication of, across the board, we need to enforce the clean air laws on the books."

The DEP timeline, included in a memo issued last month, also traces eight years of stop-and-go enforcement by the department that failed to bring the plant or either company into compliance. SMS did not return several messages left during the past two weeks seeking comment.

On May 8, the DEP cited SMS for sending 12 tons of xylene -- a hazardous pollutant that can cause respiratory and other health problems -- into the air in 2008. The amount released was 2 tons more than allowed by annual DEP limits.

Five months before the xylene notice, the DEP cited SMS for 24 violations of waste rules. The documents, dated Dec. 12, 2008, note the company kept open drums of unknown contents at the site and illegally burned unidentified piles of waste.

About the time SMS took over the plant in 2005, its predecessor, Encor, still owed nearly $13,000 in overdue annual pollution fees dating to 1994, despite DEP efforts to collect the money and pursue bounced checks, according to the DEP timeline.

The DEP decided not to press SMS for Encor's balance, according to a department memo dated Sept. 22. The agency instead will pursue SMS for the xylene and permit violations but has not yet assessed any penalties, the memo states. Many of the waste rules violations also remain unresolved.

But the plant's history of noncompliance stretches back even further, documents show. Between 2001 and 2005, the DEP sent five letters to Encor about failures to submit emissions records and annual compliance certifications, the timeline notes.

"Encor has not shown any attempt to comply with the department's rules and regulations," according to a DEP advisory issued sometime between September 2005 and February 2006. The advisory states the DEP intended to revoke the company's operating permit, which expired soon thereafter.

The DEP declined requests for interviews. Mark Carmon, regional spokesman for the agency, cited an "internal evaluation" of the company's compliance history and ongoing discussions with DEP attorneys concerning future enforcement.

The federal Environmental Protection Agency has not been involved at the plant, according to online enforcement records.

Upper Nazareth officials said they were generally unaware of the situation with SMS. Secretary Treasurer Jeri Kronstadt said she had seen notices from the DEP come into the township, but was unsure whether any of the notices referenced SMS or Encor.

Supervisor Willard Mohn said he thought he had seen notices but was unsure. Supervisors Andrew Donello, James Fahr and Michael Rinker did not return messages seeking comment. Supervisor Chairman Joseph Emrick could not be reached.

Teresa Candori, spokeswoman for the DEP, said municipalities are not always notified of companies' violations.